


I Can't Save Her

by FridaysAt9



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Canon Divergence, Christmas, Emily Arc (X-Files), Episode: s05e06 Christmas Carol, Episode: s05e07 Emily, F/M, Holding Hands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-04-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:07:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23838826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FridaysAt9/pseuds/FridaysAt9
Summary: Mulder wants to be there for Scully while she tries to fight Emily's mysterious illness, but his constant quest for answers only makes her angry. Maybe he is the reason she is in this awful situation in the first place.Emotions and angst galore. Part of the April Angst exchange.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 9
Kudos: 48
Collections: X-Files Angst Fanfic Exchange (2020)





	1. I… am Emily’s mother

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stellaxxgibson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stellaxxgibson/gifts).



> Hi everyone, my prompt from stellaxxgibson was:  
> After finding out about Emily, Mulder tries to ease Scully's pain the best he can but he ends up making things worse and she just wants him to leave her alone. Finally she realizes she needs him and takes comfort in him (kiss, hug, smut is even better) and they confess their feeling for each other.
> 
> I have never been a big fan of the Emily arc because I feel like it is just a chance to dump more pain on Scully, soI was worried this would be a challenge. In the end, I am happy with the final product and I hope you enjoy it! Thanks for the prompt!!
> 
> Oh, all italicized text is dialog from the episodes and does not belong to me. Love you Chris Carter, please don't sue me!

She had picked up the phone receiver and placed it back down at least four times and still couldn’t bring herself to dial his number. What was she going to say? How could she possibly have this conversation? 

“Hi, Merry Christmas. How are you? So it turns out I have a daughter.” 

It was ridiculous and improbable and she wasn’t even sure if it was scientifically possible, but if anyone could help her through it and come up with some hair-brained idea of how it could have come to be, it was Mulder. 

Scully let out a long sigh and picked up the receiver in her brother’s hallway one more time. She could hear them in the other room talking in hushed tones, but she knew they were listening, waiting for her to place the call. She put the receiver back down. 

She had told him so many things during their partnership, but she couldn’t formulate this conversation in her mind. She hadn’t fully digested it all herself yet. Part of her was guardedly happy, overjoyed that she had a child. When she forgot to stop herself she imagined a life of princess dresses and tea parties. Coming home to a child who she loved with every ounce she had. Tucking her into bed, kissing her forehead and shutting off her small pink lamp as she left her room, leaving the door open just a crack the way the little girl liked it. 

But then she caught herself and remembered all the uncertainty that surrounded Emily. She didn’t know if she would be able to adopt her and more concerningly, she wasn’t sure the extent of her physical limitations and what they would mean for any sort of life they would have together. 

What scared Scully was the feeling within herself of how desperately she wanted this all to work out. She could already feel an overwhelming love for this child, who had no one left in the world and who just might need her and one day love her back. She felt like she was clinging to a life preserver, hoping that it was strong enough to last and keep her afloat. That she would have her chance to be a mother after so many nights alone mourning the loss of that possibility. She was opening herself to the possibility of extreme heartache should this not go the way she wanted, but she had no power to stop this ball rolling at this point. 

Resigned to the fact that this phone call needed to happen, Scully decided to go upstairs to use her cell phone in Bill’s guest room. 

Bill’s house was exactly the same as the one they had lived in when her father had been stationed in San Diego. She knew this house like the back of her hand. Memories swam through her mind as she walked up the stairs, but instead of finding Melissa’s wall tapestries and incense and her books and teddy bears, their old room now held a crib, a small ceramic piggy bank, and baskets of diapers. The normal things required for the normal process of welcoming a child into your life. Things that would never be a part of her life. At least not in that capacity. 

With shaking hands, Scully pulled her cell phone out of her bag and pushed speed dial number one before she could stop herself. It was just Mulder. It would be okay. 

“Mulder.”

She doesn’t say anything. Why is she so nervous? She considers hanging up and dealing with all of this on her own.

“Hello?” he asks again and she knows if she doesn’t speak up now he will hang up. 

“Mulder, it’s me,” she says in her usual greeting, only this time it sounds small and strangled.

“Merry Christmas, Scully,” he says back into the phone, seemingly not noticing her tone. He sounds happy to hear from her, like he had been waiting all day for her call. “How’s the Scully clan doing? Tell me honestly, how many times has Bill called me a son of a bitch?”

Despite herself, she chuffs out a laugh. It’s good to hear his voice; it smooths over her like a calming balm, soothing her frazzled nerves. “Mulder,” she starts, “there’s something I need to tell you.”

“Scully, are you okay?” he asks, voice tinged with panic.

“Mulder, I’m fine—”

“Are you sure?” he asks with concern. “I could hop on a plane.”

“Really Mulder,” she says, considering his offer to get on a plane and how she might just take him up on it. “I’m fine. But something has happened.”

She pauses, not sure how to proceed. 

“Scully, what is it?” he asks. His tone carries so much emotion. She can tell he is nervous, but there is a softness to it as if he is longing to comfort her in any way he can. 

She sighs, deciding to start at the beginning. “I got a phone call. From a woman. I don’t know who it was, but all she said was, ‘She needs your help. Go to her.’”

“And she knew my name,” she says and pauses for a moment. “Mulder, she sounded so much like Melissa.”

“Did you trace the call?” he asks quietly. 

“Yes.”

Mulder waits a beat before saying, “Who was it?”

“I don’t know,” she tells him, “but I went to the house where the call had been placed and walked into an investigation of a suicide.”

“Whose?”

“Mulder, everything has gotten out of hand.”

“You should have called me,” he says and she doesn’t answer. 

“Anyway,” she says, feeling uncomfortable with the tone of his voice and the feelings it pulls up from within her. “It was a woman. Roberta Sims. I did an autopsy and based on my findings, I think the suicide was staged. But that’s not all. She had a daughter. An adopted daughter, with a lot of medical issues.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Mulder says. 

“Yeah,” she answers, her thoughts a jumble as she tries to figure out how to get to what she wants to tell him. She sighs. “We arrested her father as a suspect in the mother’s death. And then we found him hanging from the bed in his cell. It looked suspicious. Staged.”

“Jesus, Scully,” Mulder says. “What did you walk into here?”

“Mulder, this little girl, Emily, she has an uncanny resemblance to my sister. To Melissa,” she says, getting to the point. “When I found out she had been adopted, I ran a PCR against Melissa’s blood from the investigation of her death. Mulder, it was a match.”

“How is that possible?” Mulder asks.

“That’s what I wondered, so I ran and RFLP to confirm it.”

She stops, trying to compose herself. Her throat is tightening and she can feel the pin pricks of tears behind her eyes. 

“Scully,” Mulder says, tentatively, “What did it say?”

“Melissa isn’t Emily’s mother,” she tells him. “Mulder, the lab decided to run it against a similar sample. A sample of my blood that they had on file.”

There’s a pause as neither of them speak. In a quiet, barely audible voice, she tells him. “There was a match.”

Mulder takes in a breath, somewhere between a gasp and a painful intake. “She’s yours?”

With that, Scully can no longer hold back her tears. A sob escapes her before she can control it. 

“Scully,” Mulder says softly. “Scully, it’s ok. I’m going to book a flight. I’m coming out there.”

“Mulder…”

“Did you tell your family?”

Scully continues to cry. “Yes.”

“Hell of a Christmas,” Mulder says with a huff. 

“Mulder,” she says, sniffs and wipes her nose, “how is this even possible?”

“I have some theories,” he says and she laughs because she knew he would. 

“Mulder, I’m trying to get custody of her, but I’m not sure they will let me have her,” she says. “I am going to need you to speak on my behalf at a hearing with the judge.”

He doesn’t say anything at first. She imagines him weighing his concerns verses his commitments to her. 

“Scully, hang in there okay?” he tells her, not truly giving her assurance that he will do what she asked. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Thank you, Mulder.”

“Of course.”


	2. You Need Him

How she had managed to make it through Christmas dinner, she had no idea. To their credit, her family had pretended that everything was normal, that the member of the family who was consistently causing them stress and worry, who was abducted, kidnapped, nearly beheaded, who had survived cancer and who was almost daily putting her life at risk, hadn’t just discovered that she was somehow the mother of a child whom she had never actually birthed. No one talked about the fact that she had received phone calls from a woman who sounded frighteningly like their dead sister and daughter and no one mentioned the fact that all of this had begun with this little girl, Scully’s daughter, losing her adoptive mother to a staged suicide. 

If the Scully family was good at anything, it was suppressing their feelings with a brave face and carrying on as if everything was completely normal. As if everything was fine. 

Maggie Scully, however, was the weakest link. Although they had all, without so much as a word, decided to have a normal Christmas dinner and speak nothing of the day’s events for the time being, her mother kept glancing her way, assessing her. Checking on her. Making sure she was okay. The one time she allowed herself to make eye contact, the concern in her expression had nearly made her crumble. She fought back tears and made sure to avoid her eyes for the remainder of their meal. 

As had happened a few days prior, Maggie cornered her daughter in the kitchen while she was cleaning up, trying to keep her thoughts at bay while staying busy. She had always had the ability to draw out whatever Scully was holding in with just her mere presence. All she had to do was see her mother after a bad day at school, a fight with a friend or a painful breakup to dissolve into a pool of tears, and tonight was no different. 

Her mother tipped her head to the side, opened her arms and pulled Scully into them. 

“Dana,” she said into her hair. 

“How is this my life, Mom?” she asked through tears. “I was taken. I was given cancer. My ability to be a mother was ripped away from me, and now I have a child?”

“Dana,” she said again, pulling back and taking her daughter’s face in her hands. “You are strong. None of this is expected or typical, but if anyone can make it through this, it is you.”

Scully nodded and reached up to wipe a tear. 

“Remember Dana, God never gives us more than we can handle.”

Scully thought of the cross necklace that she had worn for the better part of her life. The necklace that now hung around Emily’s neck. It was her hope that it would provide her a comfort, and let her know that she wasn’t alone. That there was at least one person in this complicated world who was there for her. And maybe somehow, her faith, and God’s mercy would protect her and keep her safe from all the dangers she feared lied ahead. 

“Did you call Fox?” her mom asked, pulling her from her thoughts. 

“Yes.” 

Her mother waited for more. She had always been one of Mulder’s biggest supporters, the complete opposite to Bill. 

“He said he was going to get on the next flight,” she said, not wanting to say anything else. She knew her mother’s feelings and what she would like to see for her daughter’s life, and that was the exact reason she felt like she couldn’t tell her that she needed him there. She felt off balance dealing with something this massive without his presence. Since her cancer, she had started to crave his closeness. It made her breathe easy and kept the panic and dark thoughts at bay.

She didn’t want her mother to know, but she was mentally counting down the minutes until she saw him. 

“Good,” her mom said, squeezing her hand. “You need him.”

“Mom,” she started, but Maggie just raised her hand to silence her. 

“Let’s get some rest,” she said. “Tomorrow will be a long day.”

Scully was dreading it. And was excited to see Emily. And was longing to see Mulder. It  _ was _ going to be a long day. 

~~~~~

Mulder had spent the past twelve plus hours trying to get to her. He wanted to be there to support her, but the weight of the information he had was crushing him. He felt her hesitant excitement and confusion over having a child, but only he could tell her how Emily could have come to be. He only hoped she wouldn’t see his silence as a betrayal. 

He had barely slept, and was about ready to burn his clothes after his journey through a Christmas Day airport and a packed red eye flight. His lips were cracked from all the salt-covered sunflower seeds he had been compulsively eating, trying to settle his nervous energy and his desire to get to Scully. She had been there for him during so many hard times, and he needed to be there for her. It was what they did, and in their line of work and the lives that they lived, there were plenty of opportunities for one to support the other. 

After getting directions to the children’s ward, and more specifically the location of Emily Sims, Mulder tentatively entered the hospital’s playroom to find Scully sitting on the floor with a small, blonde-haired child happily coloring a picture. 

Sitting there, legs tucked under her, was the same Scully he had seen in the office less than a week earlier, but she was different now. He studied her before she noticed him. She looked small and young, and for a moment he thought, too small to be a mother, before realizing how little sense that actually made. But he felt shocked seeing her in that way with this child.  _ Her _ child. 

She was dressed more casually than she was when she was working but she still managed to look professional and pulled together as if her life hadn’t just been upended. She looked better than he did and all he had done was take a trip on a plane, while she had over the past few days investigated two suicides and discovered she was a mother to a child she hadn’t known existed. And yet her bright red hair, glowing in the sunlight, was perfectly in place. 

She was watching Emily intently, speaking to her softly and Mulder felt like he was intruding, bursting the little bubble that held only the two of them in that moment. He looked down at his shoes and considered backing out of the room and catching up with her later when she left, but when he looked up, she felt his presence and caught his eyes. He smiled at her, hoping for a smile in return, but although she held his gaze, she was singularly focused on Emily and turned back to her.

_ “Emily?” _ Scully says, leaning towards the little girl as Mulder squats down near them. _ “I'd like you to meet a friend of mine. His name is Mulder. Remember, I told you about him?” _

He wasn’t expecting her to say that, and Mulder’s heart skips a beat at the thought of Scully talking to Emily about him. 

The little girl has very little reaction and Scully tells him that she is shy. She is watching him, carefully looking back and forth between him and Emily, trying to gage how this interaction will go. He tries to make Emily laugh by screwing up his face in an impression of Mr. Potato Head. He succeeds, and earns a smile from Scully as a bonus, before she turns her face back towards her daughter. It is then that he notices the cross hanging around Emily’s neck, Scully’s cross. The one she never takes off. 

And he knows. Scully is already in love with this child. 

They step away from Emily and he tells her what he has found. He tells her about Anna Fugazzi and his belief that Emily’s adoption records have been faked. He pushes her to consider how she came into this world and why. He can see Scully grasping for straws, desperately trying to make this alright. Make it all make sense. 

He is surprised by the anger bubbling up from within himself. He knows none of this is her fault, but he is so mad at her for falling in love with this child. For opening her heart to something that can’t possibly end well. She is risking her life and her well being for a medical nightmare, even if that nightmare is masqueraded as her biggest dream. 

But then again how could she not love her?

He explains that someone out there, someone who orchestrated Emily’s birth, is doing everything in their power to protect her. Likely for their own interests, not hers. 

_ “I can protect her too,” _ Scully says with a sigh in her voice. 

_ “Yeah, but who's going to protect you?” _ he asks, trying to make her realize the danger she is in.  _ “Emily's adoptive parents are both dead, by no accident.” _

_ “I know... I've considered that,” _ she says,  _ “but I've also considered that there's only one right thing to do.” _

There is a tension between them that Mulder doesn’t know how to erase. He knows that no matter how much he impresses his concerns on her, she will keep moving forward to protect the daughter she never thought she would have. He wishes he could just shake her and make her detach herself from this situation. Make her see it as an X-file rather than a miracle. 

_ “Why didn’t you call me sooner?” _ he asks, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice. He nearly succeeds, but not quite. 

_ “Because I couldn't believe it,” _ she says, still watching Emily before turning to him.  _ “But I need you now to be a witness on my behalf in this hearing.” _

_ “And I should have declined,”  _ he says quickly, as if the thought exploded out of him.  _ “If I never want to see you hurt or harmed in any way.” _

She doesn’t look angry or sad, just tired. 

_ “Then why are you here?” _

How does he tell her? There will be a time for that, later.  _ “Because I know something that I haven't said,” _ he tells her, causing her to frown in concern.  _ “Something that they'll use against you to jeopardize your custody of Emily. No matter how much you love this little girl, she's a miracle that was never meant to be, Scully.” _


	3. Ova

They had extracted her ova. All of them. And Mulder had known about it. She had asked him why he didn’t tell her and of course he was trying to protect her. Protect her feelings. Had it not been for Emily, and a need for an explanation of how she could possibly have been conceived, Scully wouldn’t have had to know exactly why she was infertile and Mulder wouldn’t have had to be the bearer of bad news. 

Emily had changed everything. Scully had thought she was going to San Diego to spend the holidays with her family. She had thought that seeing her sister-in-law enormously pregnant would have been the most difficult aspect of her trip. Well, that and the inevitable conversation she would have had with her brother about Mulder and his disapproval of her partner. 

But instead she was on an emotional rollercoaster that started with hearing what she believed to be her sister’s voice for the first time in years and had ended with the discovery that she was a mother. None of it made sense, and her rational mind told her that something wasn’t right and that there was no way she could come out on the other side of this with the happy life she had always dreamed of, but when a child was thrown into her arms, a child who had no one else in the world and who desperately needed protection, what was she supposed to do? She jumped in with both feet, never looking back. She didn’t even consider protecting herself, keeping her heart out of it. As soon as she got those test results, her mind started to betray her, filling with plans for the future, and when she went to Emily in the children’s hospital, she was completely lost without any chance of not loving her. 

And then Mulder came. He was there to support her but his support came with barely masked warnings for her safety. She could see it in the way he spoke and the way that he looked at her, that he would help her fight for Emily, even though he didn’t think it was the right choice. Like all the times she had stood by his side when she was in stark disagreement with his theories, he stood by her, called her Dana, as he did everything he could to convince the judge that Emily belonged with her.

And mere hours later, when she had been allowing hope to bloom in her chest, she was standing in a hospital, praying for the life of this daughter she barely knew, while Mulder followed his leads, doing what he did— looked for answers. 

She didn’t want to believe this had something to do with her abduction. She didn’t want to believe that this child was part alien. She didn’t want to believe that she had been created in a lab to further a plan, a conspiracy, a partnership, between entities with only the worst intentions. 

But that was the truth. That was  _ her _ truth. The truth that this little girl was living. Mulder had gone to see her doctor, the man who wouldn’t treat her, and then inexplicably he was there. He had injected her with something and then disappeared. And she was briefly better, causing that god damned hope to build up within Scully, once again, only to fall sicker than she had been before. 

_ “I don't understand,”  _ she says to the doctor after he checks on Emily.  _ “Just an hour ago you said she was getting better.” _

_ “That's right,”  _ he says.  _ “Her fever's down, her vital signs are nearly back to normal. But these MRIs are telling me that this growth has continued to spread. What we're now seeing seems like a necrotizing of the tissue.” _

Scully knows what that means and she feels like she’s going to be sick.  _ “It's killing her.” _

She doesn’t know what to do. She doesn’t want to stop fighting. She has to save this little girl, give her a life that she deserves. 

While she stands there, trying not to fall into a pit of despair, the last person she wants to see walks in, telling her the court is not happy with the decisions she is making for Emily’s care. As if she is trying to cause her harm. No one has any idea what is happening to this girl and Scully hasn’t slept in days because all her focus has been on saving her, making her well, and these god damned men in suits are too removed from what is happening to realize that. 

_ “Do you think I don't want what's best for this child?”  _ she asks, annoyed that she even has to verbalize this.  _ “Do you think that I'm not trying to save her life?” _

Susan Chambliss looks at her with an expression that is a cross between pity and exhaustion.  _ “I'm saying I'm getting wildly differing reports. I have a job to do. I'm not the ultimate authority here, but you don't have the authority, either over this child or her future.” _

Scully is done. She doesn’t have time for this.  _ “You can get a court order and you can try to enforce it, but I suggest that if you're going to do what's best for this child, then you do everything in your power to tell the authorities that if they take Emily out of this hospital, they are going to hasten her illness. And I'll let it be known that all of you are responsible.” _

~~~~~

She was sitting in a chair in the waiting room with her head in her hands, just trying to catch her breath, exhaustion overwhelming her. Her eyes were scratchy when she blinked and her stomach growled in protest of the lack of food she had been eating. She just wanted one moment of peace, to slow down and gather her thoughts so she could continue this fight. 

And then her phone rang. 

Leaning her head as far back as it could go, letting out a frustrated grown, Scully reached into her pocket and grabbed her phone. 

“Scully.”

“Scully I found her,” Mulder says with excitement in his voice.

“Who?” She’s tired and doesn’t really care, and her tone expresses that.

“Anna Fugazzi,” he says, about to explode into what she is sure will be some fantastic, implausible and ridiculous explanation. “I found her. In a nursing home.”

“You know what, Mulder,” she says standing up. “I don’t care.”

“Scully?”   


“I don’t, Mulder,” she says, pacing in the small space. 

“Scully?” Mulder asks with concern in his voice. “What’s happening?”

  
“Nothing is happening,” she says, sighing and stopping her path. “She’s dying, Mulder… Everything was fine. Two days ago I was playing with her. And now she’s dying. And I can’t help but wonder what has changed since then.”

There’s a pause while neither of them speaks. 

“You, Mulder,” she says with a voice she barely recognizes. It’s accusatory and angry and dripping with a sort of cutting venom that she has never heard from herself. “It’s you. Everything was  _ fine _ and then you got here.”

“Scully—”

“No,” she says, cutting him off and beginning her pacing once again. “It’s true! Whenever you are involved, everything goes crazy! We almost get killed. People die.”

Her voice is rising and she’s gesturing with her hands as if he is in the room with her. “I don’t want to be a part of your crusade, Mulder. I am tired. I just can’t do it anymore.”

There’s a pause until Mulder’s soft voice comes across the line. “I’m sorry, Scully.”

“I can’t save her, Mulder,” she says, her anger draining, but only slightly. “And even if I could, they are taking her away from me.”

“Scully, I’m looking for answers—” Mulder says, but she cuts him off. 

“I don’t,” she says, and puts her face in her hand, rubbing her temples. “I just need some space right now. So I can focus on Emily.”

“Ok.”

“I’ll talk to you later,” she says, and hangs up without waiting for his response.

~~~~~

When Mulder came to the hospital, she told him she wanted to be alone. And that is how she was when Emily took her last breath, completely and utterly alone.


	4. I'd do anything for you

“Dana?” Maggie Scully says, “Fox is here to see you.”

Scully had been laying on the couch in Bill’s house since the moment she reluctantly came home from the hospital. She was so exhausted she wasn’t able to sleep, or even think. She was just staring at the fireplace, crying on and off, sobbing when she let herself. Her family had welcomed her with hugs and condolences, but otherwise left her alone to grieve and process all that had happened. 

Now she lets out a sigh and pushes herself up from the couch. Her body feels heavy and stiff and her mind is in a million places at once. She knows she has to apologize to Mulder for what she said, and she wants to turn to him for comfort, but she is afraid to see his face. She knows what she will see there, and she isn’t sure if she can handle it. 

She stands up, imagining that her body makes audible creaks as she stretches out her limbs and wraps a blanket around her shoulders before walking over to Mulder.

“Thanks Mom,” she says, not yet looking into his eyes. 

Her mom comes close and gives her a kiss on her temple. “I’ll be upstairs if you need me.”

Scully nods and watches her leave. She takes a deep breath and turns to Mulder and there it is, the look of compassion and grief— love, coloring his features. She wants to say something but can’t and manages a half smile that comes from a place of absolute sadness before stepping forward and crumbling into his strong arms. 

“I’m so sorry, Scully,” he whispers, resting his cheek on the top of her head. He says nothing else, just lets her cry for minutes, or hours, or days, until she is able to take a breath that comes out less ragged than all the others. 

She pulls back a little and readjusts the blanket around her shoulders. Mulder touches her cheek with one large hand and looks deep into her eyes, which she knows must be red and puffy. She gives him a small nod, communicating her thanks for his presence and the corner of his mouth turns up just a little. A whole conversation without a single word. 

Scully looks down at her feet, realizing she should probably step out of his embrace, invite him in and away from the door, but she is rooted in place. As much as it has been crushed, her heart is racing at his proximity and the rightness of it all. He is like the medicine she needed, the one thing that could lessen her heartache. 

“Scully,” he whispers, placing his other hand on her face, gently tipping her chin up so he can look into her eyes. As soon as their eyes meet, his face lowers to hers. Her breath catches as his warm lips press into hers. They linger there, soft and loving. It is the first time their lips have ever met, yet it feels so natural, Scully can’t understand why they have never kissed before. This isn’t the type of kiss that will lead to anything more. It is a kiss full of love and comfort, from the one person in the world who is her perfect match. The one person who can make the pain go away, even if it’s just a tiny bit.

Mulder pulls back and gives her a small nod, which she returns and again steps into his arms, placing her cheek on his chest. He closes his eyes briefly, savoring her warmth, before opening them and catching the eye of Maggie, standing at the top of the stairs. She gives him a knowing smile and walks away. 

“Mulder,” Scully says, without moving from her spot in his arms, “would you stay?”

“Of course.” 

“Bill probably has something you could sleep in,” she says, stepping back to look at him.

“Oh I’m sure he will love that,” he says, earning a small laugh from her. 

That night, Mulder in his boxers and one of Bill's old T-shirts and Scully with her puffy eyes and red nose, cuddle in bed together, as if it wasn’t something they would typically never do. He holds her when she wakes up crying. He watches her when she sleeps. 

~~~~~

“Mulder, I didn’t mean the things I said,” she tells him, turning her face from the car window. They were on the way back to Bill’s house after the misery of Emily’s funeral. They had been driving in silence, unsure what to say after experiencing a mournful Mass for a child who was never meant to live. 

“I know.”

“No Mulder, let me say it,” she said, placing her hand on his in the center console. “I know you were trying to help. Risking your life to get answers. I need you to know that I don’t blame you for any of this. This life. This job. They were my choice. I chose to be here. With you.”

Mulder quickly turned his eyes away from the road to look at her before returning his focus to his driving. “I wouldn’t want anyone else.”

He turns his hand under hers and laces their fingers together. Scully picks them up and brings his hand to her lips, placing a kiss on his knuckles. 

“Thank you for being here,” she says. 

“I’d do anything for you, Scully.”

She places their hands in her lap and watches him drive. “I know.”


End file.
